People

Gerald Schwank was a graduate student in Konrad Basler’s lab at the University of Zurich, where he obtained his Ph.D. in 2009. As a postdoctoral fellow he joined the team of Hans Clevers at the Hubrecht Institute, where he established genome editing approaches in adult stem cell systems. Soon after, he started his own lab at ETH Zurich. While initially his team was dedicated to the establishment of genetic tools to study human disease mechanisms in stem cells and organoids, more recently they have focused on the development of in vivo genome editing approaches to cure monogenic diseases. In 2020 the Schwank lab has moved to the University of Zurich, where they continue to pursue their goal of generating novel genome editors and translating these technologies from bench to bedside.

After finishing her Master’s degree in Medical Biotechnology in Vienna (2014), Desiree performed a PhD in Microbiology in the lab of Martin Pilhofer at ETH Zurich (2015-2019). In her PhD thesis she was studying bacterium-host interactions using the high-resolution in situ imaging technique cryo-electron tomography. Desiree joined our group in October 2019. Her work focuses on using base- and prime editing technologies to correct disease-causing mutations in the central and peripheral nervous system. She is supported by SNF Spark as well as the Novartis Freenovation program.

Sharan received her PhD in Cell Biology from the Centre for Regenerative Therapies, Dresden and Technical University Dresden, Germany in 2018. Working with Prof. Nikolay Ninov, she investigated regulators of pancreatic beta-cell proliferation and regeneration in Zebrafish. Sharan joined the Schwank lab as a post-doc in February, 2019 where she now focuses on developing methods to study spatially-resolved effect of base-editing and drug perturbations in tissues at single-cell resolution. Her work is supported by an EMBO Long-Term Fellowship Award.

After having worked on the first Lipid Nanoparticle encapsulated mRNA vaccines in the Langer Lab at MIT (2015), Andreas joined the group of Prof. Voros at ETH for his PhD (2016-2021). During his PhD, Andreas co-develop a novel biosensor platform themed ‘focal molography’. His work resulted in 4 patents and was fundamental for the foundation of the ETH spin-off Lino Biotech. In 2021, Andreas performed a first Postdoc in the laboratory of mRNA pioneer Dr. Steve Pascolo where he worked on trans-amplifying mRNA circular mRNA. Andreas joined our group in 2023. His work focuses on the targeted delivery of mRNA-encoded base- and prime editors using Lipid Nanoparticles.

After receiving her Master's degree from the IMC Krems in Austria, Tanja worked on her doctoral thesis in the Schwank lab focusing on the translational success of novel genome editing tools such as base- and prime editors. She is continuing her work as a postdoctoral researcher in the Schwank lab since January 2023.

Claire received her Master’s degree in Human Genetics (Department of Medicine, McGill University) in 2022. Her thesis work on how neuronal activity represses oncologic activity in medulloblastoma cells was conducted under the supervision of Dr. Livia Garzia at the RI-MUHC. In August 2022, she began her PhD in the Schwank group. Her projects will have a focus on the in vivo applications of next-generation CRISPR tools to treat genetic diseases in the brain.

Eleonora joined the Schwank lab in January 2021 as part of the URPP Human Reproduction Reloaded Project | H2R. Before, she conducted her master’s thesis (Biotechnology, ETHZ) at the Abudayyeh-Gootenberg lab at MIT in Boston, focusing on novel viral gene delivery systems and prime editing. Her PhD involves research on the capabilities and applications of new genome editing methods such as prime editing.

Lucas received his Master's degree in Interdisciplinary Science (Department of Chemistry and Applied Bioscience) from ETH Zurich in 2020, where he joined the Laboratory of Jacob Corn for his Master thesis. In May 2020 he started his PhD in our group, where he will mostly work on in vivo modeling of disease mutations together with developing new base-editor tools.

Kim received his Master’s degree in Pharmaceutical Biotechnology from the University of Ulm in 2018. He conducted his Master thesis work at the Novo Nordisk Foundation (Copenhagen, Denmark) in the group of Helene Faustrup Kildegaard. Before joining our group as a PhD student in May 2019, Kim has gained insights into industry at Boehringer Ingelheim (Biberach, Germany) and Novartis (Basel, Switzerland). His PhD projects are about the systematic characterization and directed evolution of CRISPR/Cas9 based genome modifiers.

Nicolas received his Master's degree in Biology (Molecular Health Sciences) from ETH Zurich in 2018, working in the laboratory of Sabine Werner. Before joining our group as a PhD student in August 2019, Nicolas gained insight into industry as a Postgraduate in Cell Line Development at Novartis (Basel). His PhD project is about the improvement of gene-editing tools with a focus on the correction of disease mutations and the novel Prime-editing technique.

Lukas received his Master’s degree in Biology (Molecular Health Sciences) from ETH Zurich in 2019, working in our laboratory. Since he could not let go of his exciting research, he joined our group as a PhD student shortly afterwards. His PhD project is about the improvement of gene-editing tools with a focus on applying state of the art directed evolution techniques.

Priscilla received her Master’s degree in Molecular Genetics from the University of Toronto, working in the laboratories of Alan Davidson and Sachdev Sidhu. Before joining our group, Priscilla gained insight into industry as a Senior Research Associate in Gene Editing Research at Vertex (Boston). Her PhD project aims to improve gene-editing tools with a focus on protein engineering and directed evolution.

Yanik received his Master’s degree in Nanosciences from the University of Basel in 2020. After two projects in the laboratory of Michael Nash and Florian Hollfelder, he joined the group of Mustafa Khammash for his Master thesis to work on the directed evolution of optogenetic regulators. His PhD project involves the improvement of gene-editing tools through directed evolution.

Tatjana received her PhD from the UZH in 2004. In order to see more of Europe, she moved to London to work as a post-doc at the University College London. Her project focused on a gene therapeutic approach for seizure suppression in a rat model of focal neocortical epilepsy using HSV vectors expressing galanin. In 2019, she joined the Schwank group as a lab manager. In her free time, she enjoys the company of her husband and her two teenage sons.

Conny grew up in Switzerland and has been working at the University of Zurich for many years. Outside of research she plays golf, does Scuba diving and likes to cook.

Saphira is enrolled in a Biochemistry master's programme at the University of Zurich. She joined the Schwank lab in January 2023 to work together with Kim on novel genome editors. She seeks to leverage structure guided protein engineering and directed evolution to harness ancient RNA-targeted enzymes for genome editing in mammalian cells.

Jonas is doing his Master’s degree in Biomedicine at the University of Zurich. He joined the Schwank lab for his Master’s thesis in October 2022. He is working together with Désirée on establishing base editing tools as curative therapies for neurodegenerative diseases.

Elina is doing her Master's degree in Biomedicine at the University of Zurich. She joined the Schwank lab for her Master's thesis in January 2023 and is working together with Tanja on the improvement of novel genome editors with the goal to efficiently apply them for therapeutic gene-correction approaches.